Defective and Useful

Have you ever taken a painful look at your worst behaviors and then questioned the value of your best efforts? “How useful to a perfect God is a defective person?” Well, here’s a counter question: “Is your usefulness dependent on your strengths or on His knowledge?” It’s worth pondering.

When I finished praying about this yesterday here’s what I concluded: God knows my defects perfectly, and that means I am still useful. If He knows exactly how I am broken, where the cuts, tears, and weak spots are, then He sees where the sound parts are as well. I remembered a garden hoe I had. Its handle was cracked. If I ever forgot the crack and trusted it as I would a perfect hoe, then my hand would get pinched or slivered. If I chopped with the hoe I ran the risk of breaking the handle altogether. But if I remembered the crack and picked it up carefully I could get plenty of work done. I could use the edge of the hoe with considerable force since the handle was plenty strong along that axis.

I don’t even know how I am cracked or how extensive my defects are. I have some notion of some of my weaknesses, but God knows them all. What a happy thought! He understands me so well, that He can avoid my splinters and cracks and can still get some good work out of me. I am still useful because of His perfect knowledge of my defects.